Saturday, August 23, 2008

Another 48 Hours

We are only two days away from flying out to Seoul. A lot has happened since my last post. This last week we spent giving away almost everything we own to friends and family. United Airlines' weight restrictions have limited our luggage to two 50# bags and a carry on each. We gave, donated, sold, and threw out everything we did not need until we satisfied that limit. It's really weird to look at everything you own and have it fit into two suitcases and a backpack.

On Tuesday, Savannah's parents came to Bloomington to pick us up since we sold our cars. We had dinner with my parents on the way out of town at Los Potrillos. We have heard repeatedly that Mexican food.....good Mexican food is almost impossible to find in Seoul, so we are eating as much as we can before we leave. The dinner was nice and our parents got along well.

The morning after our move to Woodstock, we got ready for our meeting with the Korean Consulate General. After a long train ride and a couple hours of shopping, we found ourselves on the 27th floor of the NBC tower filling out MORE paperwork for our visas. The interview itself was short and painless. It seemed like more of a red tape formality than an actual screening process. I'm glad it was short because I could barely breathe with my tie on. I guess I've put on a neck pound or two since the last time I had to get dressed up. The told us our passports would be ready Monday. That presented a small problem as we are leaving the country on Monday. We explained our situation and were told to leave our passports and come back on Friday. So there we were, a few days away from flying out of the country with no passports and no visas.

We then spent a night with Savannah's family just chatting, snacking, drinking, and watching the world's best terrible documentary. The next day we were able to pick up our visas from the Korean consulate and get out of the city within a couple of hours. That night we went out with some of my friends from home. Jeremy, Misti, Aaron, Alida, Savannah, and I went to a Mongolian barbecue pit, an Irish pub, and then played Rock Band until 2 or 3 in the morning. My throat is still sore from trying to belt out Sabotage. For obvious reasons I've spent most of today resting and recovering and trying to catch up on sleep from the last two weeks.

Tomorrow should just entail packing and freaking out about weight limits and things we think we forgot get, spending one more sleepless night in Christmas eve-like anticipation, and then the loss of a full day during a 17 hour journey to Korea. Check back in a few days. We'll have pics from the trip, our arrival, and our new home!

*I apologize for all of the links, but this blog is going to a lot of people and I don't want anyone to be left out on what we're doing.

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